5 Takeaways From the 2026 Salomon Quality Ski Time Film Tour

by admin in RSS Social News. Posted November 4, 2026

Over the last few years, Salomon has made their Quality Ski Time film tour a staple of film premiere season. Rather than put all their eggs in the basket of a single, feature-length film per year, the QST Tour is a curated selection of short films from their athlete team that are often a bit of a Depart-ure (see what I did there?) from the classic ski-porn formula.

The QST Tour made its annual stop in Bend, Oregon, this week, treating Central Oregon skiers to five films showcasing all styles of skiing and filmmaking. Last year’s QST Tour set the bar pretty high and left me pondering much more than your average ski film fest. Naturally, I was keen to check out the tour this year, especially with some of the projects by athletes featured in the 2026/27 POWDER Magazine Print Annual.

I walked away with thoughts not just about the tour, but about what each film brought to it and to the ski media landscape as a whole. So, without further ado, here are five of my takeaways from the 2026 Salomon QST Tour, with a bonus that this year, there’s one for each film.

The 2026/27 print issue of POWDER Magazine is here. Click here to have a copy shipped to your front door. Copies can also be found on newsstands at major retailers like Barnes & Noble, Target, Walmart, and more.

1. Learning About Weather Systems is Just as Cool as Watching Skiing

This might not be a universal take, but it’s definitely the thought I had while watching Places, a short film from Blue Max Media that features Jacob Belanger, Etienne Geoffroy-Gagnon, and Cole Richardson. The film opens with a Cosmos-style intro in which a voice-over describes how winter storms form, then reels viewers in with drippy ski visuals backed by Massive Attack’s “Teardrop,” aka the Dr. House theme song. (When I tell you my jaw was on the floor when the first notes of that banger played in the theater…)

Throughout the film, the voice-over returns to explain why Golden, British Columbia, tends to get such good snow from a meteorological perspective, before cutting back to more sick skiing. While some might watch and think, ‘more skiing, less Nat Geo,’ I absolutely loved that aspect of the film.

2. Cody Townsend & Nikolai Schirmer’s New FIFTY+ Episode Nailed the Holy Trinity of Outdoor Filmmaking

Last year, I saw The Edge of Reason on the QST Film tour, and, in short, it was an incredible film that left me sobbing into my PBR. After the year the ski community has had, I wasn’t prepared for another film like this.

Instead, Arctic Solitaire told the story of Townsend and Schirmer’s eventful trip to Alaska this spring to ski The Wizard. Townsend and Schirmer both come across as relatable and human, as does their dynamic. Yet, while Townsend’s light cynicism and Schirmer’s puppy-dog-like stoke kept me laughing throughout, the film also delivers an incredibly hard-hitting message about climate change and the finiteness of life, nature, and time. The film uses footage from Matchstick Production’s 2016 film, Ruin and Rose, which coincidentally has a plot line about the world post environmental-apocalypse, to illustrate how much the iconic spine line has changed in just ten years due to melting ice. The film ends with Cody reading an Ed Abbey quote that hit me right in the feels. To this, I say, well played, Cody & Nikolai; you got me with this one.

3. Cole Richardson Could Be the Next Eric Pollard or Chris Benchetler

Eric Pollard and Chris Benchelter are two names that come to mind when I think of skiers who have become known for their creative endeavors almost as much as their skiing. I don’t think Richardson is quite there yet, but his latest project, Alter, certainly puts him in the running. According to the show’s emcee, rather than giving his filmmakers creative direction, Richardson let them share their vision, and he tailored his skiing to the clips they wanted to film. Only a snippet of the film was shown, as the full thing is part of a two-year multimedia project that will be released sometime next year. However, what we did get to see was several minutes of unbelievably gorgeous ski visuals tied in with the gallery shows that Richardson has been putting on over the last few years. The project leans toward the further end of a conceptual art spectrum while still managing to include mind-melting pow skiing clips. If the film doesn’t wind up playing on the wall of a dark room at MoMA one day, I’ll be shocked.

4. No One Gets Quite as Creative as Sämi Ortlieb

Sämi Ortlieb’s All Electronic Transmission showcases all the things that make him stand out as a skier, while managing to incorporate a host of other talented athletes, which made it, above all, super fun to watch. The thing that stood out to me most was one of the end segments in which the film’s narration of Sämi says something to the effect of ‘I’m washed up, I’m not trying to get better at skiing because I don’t like to wear ski boots, I go skiing for me and with my friends because that’s what I enjoy, and I just want to make a film that I’d want to watch.’ That’s a massive oversimplification of the actual quote, but I loved the mentality that was so clearly conveyed in the film by Ortlieb doing what is best described as street skiing on natural features. He’s not there to show off how sick he is or that he’s the most technically talented freeskier around, but rather that skiing is what you make of it, and that’s what counts.

5. Blank Collective’s Visuals Went Above and Beyond

Rather than showcasing a bunch of athletes on a bunch of trips, this year Blank Collective’s film follows Jacob Belanger, Emma Patterson, and Ugo Troubat on their respective life paths. It’s refreshingly heartfelt as far as ski films go, and it doesn’t skimp on the skiing either. However, what stood out to me above all was the overall quality of the cinematography.

In Jacob Belanger’s segment, Blank somewhat recreated the epic sunset Whistler jump session from MSP’s Seven Sunny Days (2007), except they did it with super fancy, modern cameras because holy sh*t, the shots are gorgeous. Emma Patterson’s segment discusses the balance between running the farm she owns in the summer and working as a professional skier in the winter. The ski shots are undoubtedly epic, but honestly, I’ve never wanted to dig up carrots or vegetables as much as I did watching this. The way it was filmed gave Patterson’s greenhouse this dreamy, Hollywood quality that is rarely seen in ski media. For yet another year, after I’ve told myself high-production-value ski films aren’t that interesting anymore, Blank Collective has proved me wrong a thousand times over.

There’s only two more stops of the tour in North America this year, so if you’re lucky enough to catch it in Lake Tahoe, California or Rutland, Vermont, don’t sleep on it! You can find full tour dates and tickets here.

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